El Clásico/La Liga Jornada 12 thread

Agreed, in a highly technical game with space at a premium, Keita looked out of his depth at times. I think once Messi-Ibra-Henry are fully fit, we'll start seeing that midfield again. Strange to think that a third of the season is gone and Xavi-Iniesta (IIRC) haven't started together in midfield yet!

kas wrote:

Jaime wrote:BTW, Atletico leading Espanyol at the half in the other Madrid vs the Kingdom showdown.

Some very surprising (at least for me, you'll notice it in my low prediction score ) results this weekend...

- Depor win again, this time by keeping a clean sheet away from home. This team can really defend well...I think Barça travel there soon

- Big win for Athletic.

- Draws for Sevilla and Valencia...and the latter have lost Silva for 4-5 weeks. Big blow.

- Osasuna winning away to Zaragoza.

- Villarreal losing.

- And of course, a huge 4-0 for Atletico in the end...Forlan got on the scoresheet too. Turning point?

All of the weeks results for those who are interested:

Barcelona 1 Real Madrid 0
Atlético 4 Espanyol 0
Valladolid 3 Tenerife 3
Getafe 5 Xerez 1
Racing 0 Deportivo 1
Almería 1 Athletic 4
Zaragoza 0 Osasuna 1
Sporting 1 Villarreal 0
Valencia 1 Mallorca 1
Sevilla 2 Málaga 2

Kas highlighted the win by Depor who are now level on points with Valencia and just 5 back of Barcelona but fair play to Mallorca who are a bit further off the pace but to grab a point at the Mestalla is a great result as they continue their good form in the first half of this season - Manzano

Here is the table:

1 Barcelona 30
2 R. Madrid 28
3 Sevilla 26
4 Valencia 25
5 Deportivo 25
6 Mallorca 21
7 Sporting 20
8 Athletic 20
9 Getafe 18
10 Osasuna 15
11 Espanyol 13
12 Villarreal 12
13 Almería 12
14 Zaragoza 12
15 Valladolid 11
16 Tenerife 11
17 Atlético 10
18 Málaga 7
19 Racing 7
20 Xerez 7

Atleti finally out of the relegation zone.

My predictions for the week

Laudable Laudrup wrote:My predictions for the week

Just updated the table...you were not the only one who struggled.

Did anyone see the Sevilla-Malaga match? Sevilla came from 2-0 down, with Donkey scoring both of them.

Zokora's preformance was out of this world. When they changed to a 4-2-4 he must of covered every inch of that pitch. Oddly enough I think Sevilla's high tempo game suits him more than the EPL.

Olé wrote:Did anyone see the Sevilla-Malaga match? Sevilla came from 2-0 down, with Donkey scoring both of them.

Zokora's preformance was out of this world. When they changed to a 4-2-4 he must of covered every inch of that pitch. Oddly enough I think Sevilla's high tempo game suits him more than the EPL.

I saw it and Zokora was excellent. Thought Sevilla might find the winner as they were really pushing for it in the end.

Jaime wrote:

Laudable Laudrup wrote:My predictions for the week

Just updated the table...you were not the only one who struggled.

It did help for development of my prediction algorithm to get optimum number of points.

Gossip from Revista de la Liga

* Albert Botia, currently on loan from Barca to Sporting, is 'the new Gerard Pique' (Balague).

* Aguero - Chelsea currently looking at both him and Ribery but Atletico board won't sell in January and Aguero himself want to stay, especially in a World Cup year. However the club is resigned to losing him in the summer.

* Roberto Soldado - has an offer from Rubin Kazan which will double his wages and may go in January.

* Pennant - Villa to bid for him in the January window (Villa will also buy Bentley, according to Balague). Pennant himself wants to stay but Zaragoza suits themselves may be talking this up (they need the money).

How is Pennant getting on in La Liga, the british press have essentially ignored him.

Has he been playing? how has he performed?

Sid Lowe, who writes the La Liga column on the Guardian site, has been tracking him. He's had a couple of injuries and hasn't played that much I think.

I've only seen Zaragoza play once, the 6-1 loss away to Barcelona so I can't really say. From match reports it seems like he is more often than not in the XI but Zaragoza have been fairly mediocre.

TheCrazy58 wrote:Gossip from Revista de la Liga

* Albert Botia, currently on loan from Barca to Sporting, is 'the new Gerard Pique' (Balague).

* Aguero - Chelsea currently looking at both him and Ribery but Atletico board won't sell in January and Aguero himself want to stay, especially in a World Cup year. However the club is resigned to losing him in the summer.

* Roberto Soldado - has an offer from Rubin Kazan which will double his wages and may go in January.

* Pennant - Villa to bid for him in the January window (Villa will also buy Bentley, according to Balague). Pennant himself wants to stay but Zaragoza suits themselves may be talking this up (they need the money).

Why would Villa buy Pennant and Bentley? Isn't Downing going to be back soon? Plus they already have Milner and Young.

BALAGUE = BOLLOCKS.

TheCrazy58 wrote:Gossip from Revista de la Liga

* Albert Botia, currently on loan from Barca to Sporting, is 'the new Gerard Pique' (Balague).

* Aguero - Chelsea currently looking at both him and Ribery but Atletico board won't sell in January and Aguero himself want to stay, especially in a World Cup year. However the club is resigned to losing him in the summer.

* Roberto Soldado - has an offer from Rubin Kazan which will double his wages and may go in January.

* Pennant - Villa to bid for him in the January window (Villa will also buy Bentley, according to Balague). Pennant himself wants to stay but Zaragoza suits themselves may be talking this up (they need the money).

I don't normally agree with Balague, but they are few who would deny that Botia have been excellent for sporting so far this season.

if he keeps it up them he should definietly be brought back into the fold, with marquez going out next season, and fontas going in loan to prove himself.

with he good performances so far, it kinda makes spending 25m euros on chgrnyski a bit of a waste

Botia has done well this season, with him and Gregory Sporting have gone from one of the worst defences in the league to pretty decent. Still, I don't think it's guaranteed he is going back. Marquez just renewed his contract (in spite of Messiah's hoping he leaves), Milito is back training. As you say, you've just spent 25m euro on Chyrgrygigynsgyskigyikiy not to mention Caceres and Henrique also on loan. Not to mention Pique and Puyol, who by the way, are the first choice. And what about Muniesa? I would have thought Botia is 8th choice at the moment.

Nah

Henrqiue and caceres won't be returning


Rosell who seems the most likely to win the elections, said in one of his releases that he will be selling most players over 30.

so that's Marquez out

I also get the feeling that milito will be sent out on loan are something next season and muniesa won't be ready for another 2/3 years.

Well, wanting to sell him is one thing but the fact is Marquez JUST signed an extension and sometimes it's not so easy to flog off a player on a big wages. I will be very surprised if next year you don't have Pique, Puyol, Marquez, and Chyger on the books.

Have no idea what you will do with Caceres, Milito, and Henrique. Probably give them away for free. In which case it will be something like 45m euro down the shitter. But of course you don't pay outrageous money for players.

Oh and speaking of Rosell, saw that Txiki is promising he will not return in any capacity with a new regime. Who is Rosell's sporting director likely to be?

Jaime wrote:Well, wanting to sell him is one thing but the fact is Marquez JUST signed an extension and sometimes it's not so easy to flog off a player on a big wages. I will be very surprised if next year you don't have Pique, Puyol, Marquez, and Chyger on the books.

Have no idea what you will do with Caceres, Milito, and Henrique. Probably give them away for free. In which case it will be something like 45m euro down the shitter. But of course you don't pay outrageous money for players.

Oh and speaking of Rosell, saw that Txiki is promising he will not return in any capacity with a new regime. Who is Rosell's sporting director likely to be?

he read somewhere that he will get rid of the SD and give pep free rains on all football related activities. Kinda like Sir alex

Yeah the Sporting Director role will be covered by more involvement from Guardiola and Rosell...since the latter is pretty good with negotiations anyway, I think he'll take a first hand role in buying and selling.

Regarding the CB situation, Botia has indeed done quite well based on what I've read of Sporting's games. A few years ago I was thinking to myself - we have a lot of midfielders coming through, but no forwards or defenders. And suddenly in the last couple of seasons we see Bojan, Pedro for the former, and Pique, Muniesa, Botia for the latter. And just for good measure, there's Jonathan Dos Santos and Thiago for the midfield. Well done La Masia. Will be interesting to see what happens with the 250 or so African players that are floating around thanks to the collaboration with Etoo's academy.


Depth at CB would indeed be very deep:

1. Pique - clearly first choice and possible future club captain

2. Puyol - will probably be 1st choice for the big games but I think he will be increasingly used to cover the fullback positions

3. Chygrinskiy - still needs to improve and adapt

4. Marquez - hope we sell him

5. Milito - no idea what will happen with him...loan sounds plausible

6. Caceres - will be sold...I read that we only paid 10m up front for him, the rest didn't kick in because it was appearance based. So maybe we won't lose much on him. By all accounts, he's done well at RB for Juve when he's played. Let's hope they're convinced. A good WC will also help.

7. Henrique - no idea what will happen here either. Racing have been awful this year and in a recent match report of theirs I noticed the new manager had dropped him (though he did play another game so maybe it was just injury). I reckon we'll end up losing all the 8m we paid for him

8. Muniesa, Fontas, Botia - the first two are still young so could continue in Barça Atletic and be phased into the first team gradually depending on when Puyol/Marquez/Milito go. With Botia already on loan and doing well, he may be kept in the squad as the 4th CB along with Puyol/Pique/Chygrinskiy. Still too early to speculate anyway.

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Re. Pennant: I watched him a couple of times early in the season, and he looked ok. His crosses caused difficulty for opposing defenses, but Zaragoza's strikers weren't always on the same page. Since then I haven't watched them at all but he's been injured anyway.

Fontas is 20, i think he needs to be sent on loan as well to see how he develops.

Muniesa can play for barca atletic for a few more years and then gradually be introduced to the 1st team, maybe as a back up LB 1st.

JDS will almost certainly be a 1st team player next season, he is being given the pedro treatment this season by pep and like pedro i expect him to be promote the following season.

thiago is better and has been view as such for all of their careers in la masia, always getting promoted 1/2 seasons before JDS even thiago is younger, but pep has a thing for JDS, maybe he sees a bit of himself in JDS, thiago is more flashy and takes more risk in midfield.

they will both sign new contracts next year, JDS a youth contract & thiago a senior team contract, his father said that if he isn't a 1st team player by next season he is out.

Phil zahavi is trying to take Gai out of the club as well and i could see this happening soon.

Like Giovani, players whose agents want to push for first team chances before they are ready, can go. Pini Zahavi is a c**t anyway, don't want him involved with the club in any way. And I personally don't rate Gai too highly based on what I've seen of him till now. *Far* too lightweight to make it in a top league. Another aspect is that he's Israeli, whereas a major sponsor of the club right now is Etisalat, a telecommunications company from the UAE. Wonder what their thoughts will be if/when he's breaking into the first team.

I feel the same about Yaya. Absolutely love him as a player, but if him and his agent keep making ridiculous public threats about wanting more playing time, he'll have very little sympathy from me. If he's not content with being part of the squad, he can go. We'll easily get 20m for him from an English club.